


vault 170

by orphan_account



Category: Monsta X (Band)
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-10
Updated: 2016-06-10
Packaged: 2018-07-14 05:13:46
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7155065
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>the gates will be closing in five minutes, says the radio. it's lazy and automated but it is also the last bit of hope we have. please make your way to the designated pick-up spots and await rescue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	vault 170

 

_day 1_

jooheon came back with supplies today. he says that it's not very safe outside, so we should avoid leaving the bunker. that is, until the government radios in. they won't radio in, we just need to keep our radio on and our fingers crossed.

 

we have 26 cans of food and 20 bottles of water. they'll last us till we have to leave. we will.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 2_

 

hyungwon's back from his expedition. he was green and sweating a little too hard when he opened the vault door, but he says he was running from some of the mutants. they move really fast. almost too fast.

 

hyungwon got a gold medal for his fitness test in high school. the last time we took that was when we were sixteen and now we're eighteen, so i guess things still work.

 

hyungwon didn't manage to find anything useful while scouting, but managed to locate the supermarket downtown. it's a terrible place -- the fires from the nuclear warhead haven't died down yet, and neither have the toxic gases. hyungwon had to run before he got too close to them.

 

i don't know what jooheon was doing sending him out the moment we managed to secure a position underground. does he think that one failure safeguards us from others?

 

but hyungwon's safe now, so i guess things are fine. i saw some blood in our sink after he finished brushing his teeth, but the blood is probably from stress.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 3_

we need water once every 3 days, right? we gave out supplies today. everyone gets a bottle to last them over the next three days. it's a terrible idea but hyunwoo insisted on doing it to make sure we don't run out of supplies. jooheon replied that it would be easy to go out and find water, but hyunwoo refuses to budge. he's too stubborn for his own good.

 

hyunwoo's too scared of the possibility of radiation poisoning, or anything that would mean that he would live for a shorter amount of time. anything that would result in the government not getting to him in time. maybe he is just trying to save himself, but something being logical doesn't mean that i have to agree with it. he's too selfish.

 

thank god we don't need that much food to survive. or at least, we can go without food for quite a long time. let's hope that things go well. we can shuck the water from the baked beans if it comes to that. although it won't. probably.

 

we have 20 cans of food and 14 bottles of water. see you again.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 4_

the radio isn't working. we need it to work, because kihyun remembers from his days in government work that in event of a national emergency, the government would get its shit together within 3 days, send out an emergency broadcast. wonho and hyunwoo are taking turns messing with the frequencies and knobs, but sometimes there isn't anything but silence. other times it's static.

 

once we chanced upon a channel which had nothing but little kids' screams. pretty fucking gross. they turned the knob away from that as fast as possible. it's not fun to be reminded of your own mortality.

 

hyungwon puked up all his food from yesterday, back into the can. there were some red spots in there -- jooheon's seen it before, and he confirmed what hyungwon was going down with. he's falling sick again.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 4_

 

we got a hazmat suit today. wonho had the sense to bring it down with him. it's a pity we only have one. otherwise we would be set, maybe then we could leave together. i was tasked to take care of hyungwon and hold down the fort as kihyun left. the hazmat suit doesn't really fit him. (what was wonho doing with a hazmat suit?)

 

the radio still isn't working, so hyunwoo has given up. reading through some guide book right now. the boy scouts' handbook. be prepared, says the front cover in big gold letters. were we supposed to be prepared for a nuclear attack? don't think so.

 

were any of us supposed to be prepared? i know minhyuk wasn't, the poor fucker. he's a smear of blood on the pavement now.

 

there was a huge clump of hair tangled in my teeth when i woke up this morning. fucking disgusting. probably hyungwon's. jesus christ, things are getting bad for him and we're only on the fourth day. call me a bad man, but i'm not sleeping anywhere near him tonight.

 

_day 5_

kihyun came back with batteries. so that's what wasn't working! or maybe it was the positioning, because as soon as kihyun raised it a few centimetres outside the vault, it crackled to life. the government. oh yes, the government!

 

they say there'll be a pick up soon. they will take children first.

 

fuck. the only one who can pass off for a child here is me, and i'm twenty. women next, then men. that's good, i suppose. we can all leave together. more information will be transmitted soon.

 

the hazmat suit in the corner looks gross. i'm not going to wash it. not that the water supply down here would make it less dirty -- if anything, it would turn it an even darker black. jesus.

 

i'm really sleepy, we've did a lot today. will turn in now.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 6_

water supplies are being given out tomorrow. my bottle finished itself on day 4, so i'm fucking parched. i'm considering accumulating my saliva, but my mouth is dry and sticky so that's that.

 

we haven't spoken in over twelve hours -- we ran out of hangman games to play and more importantly, the spirit to play them. we've settled for sitting around, dead-eyed. occasionally someone will exhale sharply before leaving the vault, but never too far out before they come back. cabin fever. it's lonely here, even though i'm surrounded by five people.

 

i'm not feeling the cabin fever as much. i'm mostly intensely concerned, because i've been waking up with hair between my teeth for a few days already. there was some blood when i pulled the latest ball out of my teeth this morning, jelly-like. fucking disgusting. i don't know who's the source of it -- i've been keeping my distance from hyungwon.

 

hyungwon and kihyun didn't wake up till well past noon today, and even then, hyungwon was slow to crawl out of bed. poor boy, must be tired. he's getting better -- i saw kihyun feed hyungwon some of his water discreetly. too nice.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 7_

water! i have a bad headache, but it disappeared the moment i had a sip. i have to ration myself this time; the first time i rushed and rushed and didn't have any water left. 500ml can last a long time. right?

 

was sent out today, again. it was... unpleasant. the situation isn't getting better, although the fires are mostly out. there's only black pavement and brutally rough road now.

 

there was one fire, though. it's been raging for days now. it's stagnant, unmoving, and for that, i'm glad. i don't know what i would do if another fire tornado erupted.

 

jooheon says we might be thrown into a nuclear winter. not now, but soon.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 8_

jooheon says that hyungwon has radiation poisoning. hyunwoo had brought it up after looking through the boy scouts guidebook. we can't tell how much radiation got into hyungwon when he went out, but he's still living and breathing, so he must be alright. jooheon told him to take a bath, to wash off the trace amounts of radiation on him.

 

i snuck a look in hyunwoo's book when he was off with kihyun. hair loss is one of the symptoms. aha.

 

not much to update on today. i have a bad headache. wonho's nursing the urge to leave the vault and go scavenge, be the park ranger he was before the apocalypse. the other three have been poring over the map for a day.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 9_

the fucking radio isn't working. this morning, i was listening to nothing, staring at the ceiling when i realized there wasn't even any fucking sound! not even the static was there. the radio's a lost case. it's been crumpled, bled into, it's fucking gone.

 

blood? blood? hyungwon did it.

 

i don't know why i did it, but i had to. the others were yelling at me to cut it out, but i smashed hyungwon against the ground, screamed at him. the radio was our only source of hope and he fucking blew it.

 

hyungwon's alright. he's breathing a lot more shallowly and he's still asking me what's wrong even after i cooled down. he knows what's wrong! the radio's gone!

 

-changkyun

 

_day 10_

so a knock came on the door this morning. heard voices from outside the vault, a bit of laughing. slapped it and told it to shut up. could hear footsteps stalking away.

 

kihyun wanted to let them in, but hyunwoo told him that they could be hostile. for once, i'm relieved that hyunwoo is so paranoid.

 

the government says that the nuclear warheads detonated over the world wiped out most human life. if we're hearing this, it means we're the last people on the planet. the chosen ones. haven't we always been?

 

hyungwon hasn't looked at me or spoken to me for the whole day. two can play this fucking game.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 11_

we have two bottles of water left. hyunwoo says to ration it well, because we might not go on another expedition for a while. when i asked why, he said something about it being dangerous out.

 

bullshit! the radio's broken, how would he know? then he tried coming up with some fucking crock shit about how people might be cannibalizing each other, and that we leave, we're in trouble.

 

he's so full of shit i'm amazed the place hasn't been stunk up.

 

there wasn't any blood or hair when i woke up this morning. ran a hand over my smooth arms and head, was relieved. finally. the headache has subsided too, although the people who keep banging at our door are getting on my nerves and might bring back the headaches.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 12_

couldn't take it any more. i told hyunwoo that i was going out whether he liked it or not, left the vault. i don't have the hazmat suit, i don't know where it went. wonho told me that it wasn't safe, but i know he's just plotting with hyunwoo to keep me shut in. guess what? i'm not your cute little scribe. i'm human too, so fuck you and fuck your agenda. i hate all of it.

 

didn't see much when i got above ground, although the people who've been rapping on our door have finally fucked off. that's a good thing. the place's a wasteland, jesus. the fires have burnt themselves out, and in its place is nothing. just ash and black and hell, even the ground looks burnt.

 

who knew that the world would end like this? i don't think there's building up from this. it's the apocalypse, finally!

 

i got a rifle from a bunch of people when their backs were turned. they were a nice bunch, so i did what i had to do. better to steal from a baby than a rabid dog. they shot after me as i was running away, but the bullet whizzed straight past me and i got back down safely.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 13_

jooheon is full of shit. just like hyunwoo. he kept trying to back hyunwoo up, tried to make me sit down when i came back. fuck, everyone's just angry because _i_ got the rifle and they didn't! it's my weapon, my rules. they took it away from me. i took it! it's mine! they'd better watch out, because i've made friends with the people knocking on our vault and if jooheon pushes me any further he's going to get it.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 15_

today the vault door opened. not because any of us were leaving, but because we had to throw a body out.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 20_

today kihyun got out of the vault to retrieve jooheon's body. we've run out of food - haven't been able to find anything but water. my mouth isn't that dry and sticky any more, and i'm not that headachey. must've been a bug hyungwon gave me.

 

hyungwon and wonho don't speak very much these days, both to each other and to the rest of us. wonho spends most of his time reading the guidebook even though he's holding it the wrong way. hyungwon sleeps the many moons away, hugging the broken radio. fucking slag.

 

sometimes, they try to pull a fast one on me. they say that we can move out of this hellhole in two weeks, although who are they kidding? how would they know? the radio's broken. hyunwoo says that the transfer of the children was successful, and only one died in transit. good statistics.

 

jooheon tasted good.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 21_

i fell over myself today. don't know what happened, got pretty weak. whatever, though - the floor of the vault isn't that rough. i'll survive.

 

and if i don't, good riddance.

 

i don't know where kihyun stashed my rifle. i'll make all of them pay when i do find it, but for now i think i'll lay low. like a boa constrictor, you know? lie in wait, then crush the life out of you.

 

jooheon's body will sustain us for the next few days, maybe even weaks if we pace ourselves. i had his eyeball for dinner. sucked out the buttery goodness in the middle, clenching the harder parts at the side in my fingers (it crunched). ah... it was good. very fatty though, like the detached part from fried chicken. probably put my arteries in a chokehold.

 

wonho says i can try applying some of his blood on my skin to give it a shinier look. says my skin has been wrinkly. whatever. wonho's full of shit anyways.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 22_

haven't been sleeping. had his other eyeball for tea.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 24_

some people visited us today. i was allowed to open the vault door (has it gotten much heavier or is it just me?) to let them in.

 

it's the people i stole the rifle from.

 

i don't know how they managed to track them down. what i can tell you is that i was scared shitless. let down my hair for a change, even though there wasn't much difference when they finally spotted me. one of the feistier characters in their faux cowboy group lunged at me, pulling me by the corner.

 

hyunwoo hesitated a little before pulling him off me. talked him into letting us keep the rifle, but they insisted on taking the two boxes of rounds i stole. so it's the belt of ammo i have stashed in my pants. that's it.

 

this might as well be the end.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 27_

i saw wonho stealing the food that was given out today. i don't know how he got it, how he managed to sneak into kihyun's bags without kihyun noticing but he did that! he did that, took a slab of jooheon's flesh! he even had the audacity to stand up!

 

i attacked him. i don't have much but i _do_ have overgrown nails and that was enough to dig into his eye sockets. there was a sort of resistance, you know? like the surface of jelly. more jelly analogies. it was pushing and pushing and then it was blood, and he was screaming and i had a shard of his own little universe in my hand.

 

i ignored his screams. he tried to say things like _i was going to pass it to kihyun_ but we all know that all martyrs do is lie.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 29_

pickup is in five days. i woke up this morning unable to move. kihyun screamed and screamed last night when wonho showed him what i'd done. why isn't kihyun thankful? he would've gone hungry for another day if it wasn't for me?

 

jooheon spoke to me today. he tells me it's stupid. i know it's stupid, jooheon, that's why.

 

the rifle has one more bullet in it. i don't know whether hyunwoo or hyungwon deserves it more.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 31_

did you know you could kill two people with one bullet? line them up and shoot them in their sleep. it's not my fault, really. i've heard things. they're planning to throw me out of the vault for good, tomorrow. i can't leave this place. it's the only place i know as home and it's my place. the world's ending, but i can't. not here, not now.

 

wonho has been comatose since the other night. pickup is in three days. kihyun keeps giving me disgusted looks.

 

fuck him.

 

-changkyun

 

_day 33_

i saw myself in the mirror today. it was an accident, i was polishing the butt of the rifle and i saw myself. where did all my hair go? this isn't me. why am i bleeding so much? i put it down to touching hyunwoo and hyungwon's corpses, but no, it's from me. there's so much of it, gushing from my nose and ears and how did this happen?

 

i tried to look for water to wash it away, but it disappears as soon as i touch it. what's going on? what's

 

_/_

changkyun's just woken up from his latest fever dream. he says things about killing us, sometimes. other times he goes on about people we don't know and screams his throat sore.

 

i don't know what's happening, none of us do. we suspect it's because he was the most exposed to the radiation when the bomb first dropped. we should never have let him go out like that. how could we have done it twice? he was fine for about a week, and then-- oh god. oh god.

 

changkyun, we're sorry. we shouldn't have done this. but in this world it's everyone for themselves and you just aren't useful any more. there's no use bringing someone who can't fend for themselves.

 

"it's time to go," wonho calls out, turning away from me and handing the key to me. we agreed that locking changkyun in with the ventilation off would be the best course of action. he can suffocate and die quickly. better than rotting away to nothing, reddened skin and bones.

 

 _the gates will be closing in five minutes_ , says the radio. it's lazy and automated but it is also the last bit of hope we have. _please make your way to the designated pick-up spots and await rescue._

 

i turn around, even though hyunwoo and hyungwon are asking me to walk faster because we don't have time. god, why are we doing this? i watch changkyun shake in his bed, yell about bullets and how he doesn't have any hair left on his head, how much he's bleeding, how much he's suffering.

 

i close the door, double lock it. goodbye, changkyun.

it's time to let go.

**Author's Note:**

> 170 = X in octal. (i would put MONSTA X in octal but 115 117 116 123 124 101 040 130 015 012 doesn't have a ring to it)


End file.
